SDSU players going on offense against fat

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The biggest losers are both left guards. Emilio Rivera and Alec Johnson – Nos. 1 and 1A on your San Diego State depth chart – dropped 33 pounds apiece in their first six months on the Brady Hoke Diet.

Rivera and Johnson are leaner, meaner and not yet a “tweener.” They begin fall practice today as Exhibits A and A1 of Hoke's football philosophy, in which quickness trumps size and, up to a point, less is more.

“It would be great to have a 325-pounder with between 16 and 19 (percent) body fat,” the Aztecs' first-year head coach said. “But when you start getting over 21 or 23 and up, you've got some bad weight. If you have the bad weight, then you don't have the great muscle mass that you need and the strength and the explosion and the endurance.”

Bad weight is in a bad way these days at SDSU. Between their first Hoke Era weigh-in on Feb. 2 and their most recent scale session on July 27, the 16 linemen on the Aztecs' roster shed a total of 303 pounds – nearly 19 pounds per man.

What that will mean on Sept. 5 at UCLA is uncertain – the Bruins' offensive line averages 312 pounds, after all – but Hoke believes diminished bulk does not necessarily mean diminishing returns. And his players appear to be responding as if their new coach's challenge had been, “Who wants ice cream?”

“I've dropped about 15 or 20 pounds, and I'm actually the strongest I've been in my entire time at State,” said Ernie Lawson, SDSU's junior defensive tackle. “I was able to do 17 reps and 225 pounds, the most I've ever done. In January, I was able to do 10. (But) I hope the biggest difference is I'll be able to have my motor going for the entire play.”

Though injuries and depth issues influenced their fate as well as conditioning, the 2008 Aztecs were a team that consistently crumbled in the fourth quarter. The team finished 2-10, but it was 0-10-2 head-to-head in the final period, outscored by the eyesore margin of 146-43.

“There were times at the end of the season when your body is all beaten up,” junior center Trask Iosefa said. “This training we've done so far is going to help us at the end of the season and in the fourth quarter. It is going to help us finish those games, the close games.”

That's the idea, anyway. It may take years before Hoke can accumulate enough talent to pose a threat to the elite of the Mountain West Conference – Utah, TCU and BYU ranked 17th, 18th and 24th nationally in the USA Today Coaches preseason poll – but an attitude can be imparted immediately.

“As coaches, we're into bodies,” Hoke said. “We're into how guys look and their athleticism, and (we're) trying to make judgments. You do it in recruiting all the time and you do it with your own players. You're looking at butts and you're looking at thighs and legs.

“When we first arrived here, we started seeing, with the offensive linemen in particular, guys who didn't look fit, didn't look strong, just didn't fit the mold of what we want.”

Target weights were assigned, and incremental progress was measured on a weekly basis. Players who failed to meet their goal each Monday were ejected from the weight room under the threat that they would have to make up their missed workout at 6 a.m. on the following Saturday.

When Hoke speaks of “consequences” in his sinister/sadist voice, this is what he means: predawn iron-pumping.

“If a guy's half a pound over and he's trying, I won't (penalize him),” said Aaron Wellman, SDSU's football strength and conditioning coach. “I don't want to create a situation where guys are doing the wrong thing to lose weight, like going into the sauna in a rubber suit.

“But if you're a repeat offender, then we have to look for some other form of motivation. . . . You can't be overweight and expect to move well.”

Can't argue with that. Excess heft clearly hurts a player's endurance and his agility, makes it harder for him to shed blockers and find flattering pants, and takes a toll on both the heart and the upholstery.

My own sloth aside, this is a serious matter. A recent study of nearly 3,700 Iowa high school linemen found that 45 percent were overweight and 9 percent could be classified with severe adult obesity. Football's trenches, it seems, are a magnet for trenchermen.

Trask Iosefa has gained control of his diet by eliminating sweets and drinking more water. He has slimmed down from 309 to 285 pounds, and rewards his discipline with weekly binges from McDonald's Dollar Menu. Ernie Lawson prefers to indulge his cravings with Trujillo's California burrito.

It can be a cruel thing, curbing a big man's appetite, and it is crueller still when one man remains exempt in the midst of so much sacrifice. While his fellow linemen have been under pressure to scale back, Aztecs offensive tackle Peter Nelson has been encouraged to eat; to pack another 15 pounds on a frame that carried about 275 last season.

“While they were starving themselves, I was eating all their food,” Nelson said. “There were some eyes glaring at me while they were eating their salad.

“But the weight just kind of fell off these guys. Now they're able to play better – better technique, better leverage, which is going to equal better success on the field.”

That's the idea, anyway. In football, at least, a slim chance is preferable to a fat chance.